MDMD(2): Deflation and Friendship flip-flop

[andrew at cee.hw.ac.uk]

jp4321 at idt.net writes:
> It is interesting, also, how well Pynchon uses their difference in *rank*
> to allow them to get to this stage. Mason's authority provides him, inspite
> of his melancholia and inward concerns, "a cover", in the early going,
> allowing him to face Dixon and Dixon's more open nature, until he is able
> to open up himself.

Not sure I totally agree about Mason having any `useful' authority
(although Mason does sometimes *try* to pull rank).  Recall the scene
in the Saloon of Mason's Inn where the narrator states that they are
both wary as to how the power will be sorted out between them. And
indeed the outcome of that meeting is a standoff since they are both
successively misled, embarassed, astonished and ultimately impressed
with each other. I don't see either one having the upper hand from
then on.

Nor do I concur with your (deleted) comment that there is no cute
meet. The Saloon meeting seems pretty much like that to me. What I
found most impressive about that scene was the way Pynchon managed to
give you the characters' perspectives on each other rather than the
narrator's. Or rather, he gets his narrator to insinuate what the
characters' views were but, to add to the sinuosity of it all, most of
the time he presents you with their misinterpretations,--
interpretations which are corrected by later, usually subtle,
revelations in the narrative or dialogue; and, to boot, they are often
presented so as to make it look like they are the narrator's
misinterpretations.

Even Mailer, when he gets into the mind's eye of his subjects, as few
writers are able to do so brilliantly, usually only manages to present
their psyche directly (i.e. recreates it as he imagines it was at the
time). Pynchon, by cloaking his perceptions in these doubly indirect
reports, shows an incredible mastery of the art of story-telling. Oh
and he also nails that ridiculous line about 2-dimensional
characters. Nothing 2-d about the overlapping mental topographies we
peruse in this scene.


Andrew Dinn
-----------
We drank the blood of our enemies.
The blood of our friends, we cherished.